I firmly disbelieve, myself, that our human experience is the highest form of experience extant in the universe. I believe rather that we stand in much the same relation to the whole of the universe as our canine and feline pets do to the whole of human life. They inhabit our drawing-rooms and libraries. They take part in scenes of whose significance they have no inkling. They are merely tangent to curves of history the beginnings and ends and forms of which pass wholly beyond their ken. So we are tangent to the wider life of things.

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Original Citation

James, William. "Pragmatism and Religion." Dec. 1906, Lowell Institute, Boston, MA, USA. Lecture.

Current Citation

James, William. "Pragmatism and Religion." Pragmatism. Dover Publications, 2018.